


The King is Dead

by Quilljoy



Category: Weiß Kreuz
Genre: Alternate Universe, Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Alternate Universe - Reincarnation, Community: weissvsaiyuki, Gen, Non-Canonical Character Death, Past Character Death
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-06-02
Updated: 2015-06-02
Packaged: 2018-04-02 12:46:29
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,490
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/4060552
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Quilljoy/pseuds/Quilljoy
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Based on indelicateink's prompt: "WK - Weiss and Schwarz died in the fall of the tower in 1998. It is up to Aya-chan to clue in the eight reincarnated young men who find themselves drawn back to Tokyo in 2015."</p>
            </blockquote>





	The King is Dead

**Author's Note:**

  * For [indelicateink](https://archiveofourown.org/users/indelicateink/gifts).



It isn’t about setting things right, nor about second chances. If Aya’s to be honest, it isn’t even about the boys, in the end, as much as it’s about her own selfish desire to understand what’s happened for all these years she’d been asleep. The world twisted and turned as she dreamed, tugging at the edges of her consciousness.

She was the only one to come out unscathed - but not unchanged.

It’s seventeen years until the world shifts again and she’s thrown out of balance for the second time in her life.

 

“You are not what you look like, are you?”

Aya blinks out of her reverie to stare at the young man in front of her. She’s been cradling her drink for the past hour, pretending to take sips as she takes in the conversation of others. At one point she’d forgotten her job entirely to gaze out of the windows. Up there, with the glass the size of a wall, Tokyo looks small. Breakable. It’s a wonder the city thrives when it’s been through so much in the past decades; it’s a miracle family feuds haven’t torn it in half yet.

For a foreigner, the boy speaks Japanese pretty well. She doesn’t detect a hint of an accent as he draws closer, seemingly interested in a lone woman with a glass of champaign. How inconspicuous, she’d told her boss sarcastically, ages before. Aya’s been the lone woman far longer than it’d have ever been appropriate, but she plays the role well - mostly because she’s been on her own ever since Sakura left. Rex says there’s an air of distress around her. And though she’s in her early thirties, she doesn’t look one day above twenty. Her smiles are more prey than predator.

She isn’t either of them, of course. But she suspects the young man thinks of her more of the first than the later.

“Absolutely not,” she laughs. “You should look for other company. You’re too young for me, don’t you think?”

The boy draws a chair, sitting next to her. His proximity doesn’t bring the usual warmth a suitor does. There’s a coldness in him that’s she’s seen trained into agents before. He wears it well, but not efficiently. Everyone in these parties verges into the edge of drunkenness, just tipsy enough to let others’ guards fall. But then, she supposes he isn’t old enough to drink anyway.

That, or he doesn’t care much for pretenses. The boy ignores her statement to direct a look towards the middle of the room, where Mr. Takatori Saijou entertains the guests, and pretends not to die.

“Another happy year,” he says. So he can tell, Aya muses. Mr. Takatori sits straighter and taller than anyone in the party, but the boy can tell.

“Long live the king.” She raises her glass.

“It’s an old saying,” he nods approvingly, as if he isn’t talking to a woman twice as old as he is. “The king is dead, long live the king. We all dance as puppets as we await for his death. I wonder, is that why a Kritiker agent such as you is here?”

She stops her glass just above her lips. Aya’s never been good at fashioning her expressions into weapons. Mediocre, at best. She usually doesn’t have to.

She just listens, that’s all. There isn’t much else she can do. There isn’t much else she wants to do, when listening and learning is why she’s working for Kritiker, in the end. That, and their closed records.

Aya eases into a smile, but doesn’t treat the kid as if he were dumb just because he’s a kid.

“I’m sorry, I didn’t say who I am. My name’s Fujimiya Aya,” she bows her head. She isn’t surprised when his eyebrows meet in the middle of his forehead; if he knows Takatori, and if he knows Kritiker, he’s probably heard her name before. “I’m heiress to the Fujimiya family. Mr. Takatori has quite the investments in our bank.”

“You family was involved in a scandal,” he says, as a matter of fact. Quite the remarkable young man. Who is he exactly, she wonders, though he makes no move to introduce himself. It’s instinct that tells her he’s not as confident as he feigns. Through poise only, he looks like he’s been studying their politics since he was a babe. The glasses pinch his nose and obscure his features. He could be younger than he looks like. Her exact opposite.

He isn’t quite there yet, Aya can tell. But men like him are destined for greatnesss.

“I’ve worked very hard to clear any misunderstandings.” Another reason for her joining Kritiker, after all. Ran left her no short of money, but this. A name carries more value than gold, these days. Of course she could never imply the Takatori family in the fall of her house - but why would her? Takatori is old. His last heir withered in the bottom of the ocean with only her brother and his friends for company.

Some days, she can only be happy for them. Small victories. There would be no more dirt associated to their names, not if Aya can help.  Ran would’ve been happy for her. If only…

“There was an accident.”  The boy interrupts her thoughts once more. His rudeness can only be excused by his heritage. When she dares to look at him again, he doesn’t look as composed as she’d first thought him to be. “Only it wasn’t an accident, was it. It was…”

By his expression of distaste, she knows he knows he’s speaking too much. He’s dissatisfied, not because he’s offended her, but because he’s talking when giving information away should never come for free. Aya’s at once nauseated and intrigued. He knows something she doesn’t. But that’s a connection he’s just made.

He gets up before she can raise any objection.

“Fujimiya Aya,” he says again.

“Mrs. Fujimiya,” she corrects him. He looks at her as if he’s never seen any odder. “And it’s impolite not to introduce yourself, Mr. Crawford.”

The name is out before they both notice it. She frowns immediately - “What? Why did I…” - only he isn’t paying her apologies attention. The slip couldn’t have been a mistake; women like Aya are trained not to make mistakes. Though the boy’s foreigner and his sharp features look like a faded picture shoved in the bottom of her drawer, it doesn’t warrant this error. It’s not even like she knew Schwarz, not beyond the files she’s gathered from Kritiker in her attempts to pierce together what happened to her brother. Not beyond Sakura’s stories.

_They were cold, and they didn’t care for any of us,_  Sakura had said.  _I’m glad they’re dead._

It shakes him as much as it does for her. He’s just a boy. He isn’t responsible for her parents’ deaths.  He isn’t responsible for Ran’s death. He isn’t responsible for her lost years.

Just a boy, that’s all. But he doesn’t seem to believe it as well.

He seems to be telling her his actual name once she’s finally able to focus.

“- my family has great interest in Japan’s future. It’d do well for you to remember my name.”

Aya nods, mind somewhere else entirely. It’s downright unprofessional, but this is what’s been looking for nearly two decades. This… past she’d played no part on.

If she was a pawn once, she’s gathered enough of herself to become a player. Before the boy leaves, she presses her business card against his hand. This isn’t right, she knows. He’s a someone else entirely. He should not be involved in this, even though he is, already, by designs of his own family. Makes she wonder if he’s the only one.

Makes she wonder if Ran, too, is somewhere…

Crawford would have no reason to help her, but the boy isn’t Crawford.

“Please.” And because this wouldn’t do, wouldn’t work at all, she puts on the facade Kritiker taught her so carefully. “I have information that might be of your interest. If you’re willing to share. Mr. Takatori is dying, after all. We could be so strong once he’s left. If we work together.”

It isn’t a trap. It isn’t true, either, but no one is true in the room; scavengers, the whole lot of them, just waiting until Mr. Takatori’s death so they can pick up the scraps. Aya feels like she could come out with the most valuable thing of them all, if the boy would just listen.

He picks up her card after a single moment of hesitation.

She smiles. It feels like histeria bubbling up on her throat. She’ll find them all, and she’ll finally become someone again. She and Ran, and all of the men she never grew up with but knows intimately.

“Remember my name,” the boy says. It’s a threat as much as it’s a promise.

“I could never forget.”

 

 


End file.
